Abstract

Symmetry principles and theorems are of crucial importance in optics. Indeed, from one side, they allow obtaining direct insights into phenomena by eliminating unphysical interpretations; from the other side, they guide the designer of photonic components by narrowing down the parameter space of design variables. In this Letter, we illustrate a significant departure from the Babinet spectral complementarity in a very common and technologically relevant situation: that of a patterned conducting screen placed on a subwavelength dielectric slab. The symmetry property predicted by the Babinet theorem is correctly recovered for pairs of geometrically complementary–but less realistic in terms of applications–free-standing patterned screens. Our analysis merges experimental data with fully vectorial electromagnetic modeling and provides an alternative form of the Babinet theorem that highlights a connection with the concept of electromagnetic duality.

© 2020 Optical Society of America

Babinet’s principle for mutual intensity

Sergey Sukhov, Mahed Batarseh, Roxana Rezvani Naraghi, Heath Gemar, Alexandru C. Tamasan, and Aristide Dogariu
Opt. Lett. 42(19) 3980-3983 (2017)

Reconfigurable multifrequency and wide-angle directional beaming of light from a subwavelength metal slit with graphene metasurfaces

Zezhao Ju, Ming Deng, Jian Wang, and Lin Chen
Opt. Lett. 45(10) 2882-2885 (2020)

Launching phase-controlled surface plasmons on Babinet metasurfaces

Lijun Guo, Bin Zheng, Kun Zheng, Muhyiddeen Yahya Musa, Shang Gao, Zehao Wang, Shahram Deshdashti, Hongsheng Chen, and Yihao Yang
Opt. Lett. 43(14) 3253-3256 (2018)

Dynamically reversible and strong circular dichroism based on Babinet-invertible chiral metasurfaces

Xiaoqing Luo, Fangrong Hu, and Guangyuan Li
Opt. Lett. 46(6) 1309-1312 (2021)

Photonic jets from Babinet’s cuboid structures in the reflection mode

Igor V. Minin, Oleg V. Minin, and Igor S. Nefedov
Opt. Lett. 41(4) 785-787 (2016)